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It’s just another frontier of science with its own risks and rewards. Sure there are ways to use or produce it immoraly, but it’s not inherently immoral.
DNA is just a polymer, one we have some capabilities in manipulating. It is not inherently alive, nor do it’s instructions necessarily have to relate to something living. When processed by living things they contain instructions on producing proteins, but they don’t need to be processed by living things and could be used to store arbitrary information in a dense environment.
Neurons, while cellular are not alive in and of themselves. They require a full host to operate, but are essentially weighted dynamic switches (interneurons), environmental inputs (sensory neurons), or outputs (motor neurons). Devoid of a host they are inert, but provided the right artificial environment they can function. “Function” just means operating in that input, switch, output mode though–it doesn’t mean being alive as a macroorganism, being sentient, or having feelings. Using a handful of farmed human neurons to play Doom is more an exercise in controlling the dynamic environment needed for the switch connections to be made, therefore, than an exercise in enslaving a conscience person.
Nature has been the source of inspiration and development since before the dawn of humans. I see no reason it should stop at the doorstep of biology–especially when the extent is cultured environments developed in a lab to be a facsimile of a part of a living thing. A part of living thing does not a living thing make.
cattywampas@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Why do you think it’s disgusting and immoral?
Tree@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
idk it rubs me the wrong way,like what if they are sentient and we are tormenting them?
also i have some religious beliefs that ban altering of creation of god. and i think biocomputing would be included in that.
cattywampas@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
What if computers are sentient and we’re torturing them too?
unmagical@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
I encourage you to learn more about the subject and close some of your knowledge gaps. You still may not agree with myself on the matter, but you’ll hopefully be able to elucidate your concerns more concretely. As it stands now, however, “idk” and “it rubs me the wrong way” seem like a fear of the unknown which is an insecure basis upon which to construct a belief system or guide your principals.
I’m curious which greater religion you espouse. I’d argue that virtually any human action is one of alerting, and while predation, gathering, locomotion, and vocalization could be ascribed to alter in a manner consistent with a god given design, every action from cooking onward directly alters “creation” in a manner not inherent to our biology. That is to say, once we adopted tools and fire we ascended above the actions of other animals.
breadsmasher@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago